Greetings from Orick, California! You may have heard, I have returned to the redwoods. I came back to the US on April 25^th and started my old job at Redwood National Park on April 27^th. It has been a little insane adjusting to the sessile life of a non-traveler, but there are some perks…. I can take a bath whenever I want, I can buy lots and lots of different kinds of food, I can hang out with my friends in town, I can watch cheesy movies on my computer, I can enjoy a douche-bag-free commute, etc. I managed to convince the park service that they should rent me a house to live in too! It is so very nice. It is 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom and it is furnished. It even has a washer and dryer…and they both work! I have a wood stove and wood. I even have a bay window over my porch that I am trying to populate with potted plants. I also just got a new house mate on Thursday named Gary who is from Britain. He is very nerdy and limey, which is just great!

The job is pretty sweet. I am a seasonal fish and wildlife tech so I get to run around in the forest, on the beach, and in the rivers looking after the parks varied forms of wildlife. I don’t get health care or retirement, and this is not a permanent job, but it sure is fun! I will be working in this job till about the end of September or early October, then I can have the option to come back in the following March.

The work is almost entirely in the field and is highly varied. I have been doing spotted owl surveys (hiking off trail in the woods at night hooting like an owl), corvid surveys (hiking on and off trails, and hanging out in campgrounds counting crows, ravens, and jays), plover/carcass surveys (walking down very long stretches of sandy beach with binoculars inspecting birds, seeking a little tiny one that looks just like a sandy rock and never finding any, also poking at dead bird, seal, and sea lion bodies), and I will be doing some intertidal surveys here in a few weeks (counting snails and petting algae on rocks while it is pissing down rain and hoping the next big wave won't take me to my watery grave). It is good fun.

I have seen so many beautiful things since I have been back in the redwoods. Sometimes I wonder how I can be so lucky as to get paid to go out to work in such a great place. Enjoy the pictures and consider visiting…

Trillium ovatum

Trees at Ten Taypo trail
Harbor Seals at Redwood Creek Estuary
Sea Palm (Postelsia californica), this is an alga!
Sunshine through the Redwoods on a foggy morning
Mature Bull Elk (this photo is from a few falls ago)
View of the mouth of the Klamath River - I used to live very close to here
Rock and Tidepools at Damnation Creek Beach
Barred Owl (relative of the spotted owl)
Columbine
Lupine in the Bald Hills!!!
Another neat flower in the bald hills
Screwing blues - probably greenish blue butterflies caught in the act in the Little Bald Hills
Mardon Skipper - Little Bald Hills
Dewy lupine leaves
Great Arctic - Little Bald Hills
Female Crab Spider with a skipper (Pyrgus communis) as prey.
Calochortus lilly
Bearded lady
Lupine in bald hills
I love it!
Alligator lizard


There are fungus among us!
Got crabs? Yes!
Intertidal at Enderts Beach Cove
Seastars and anemones at Enderts Beach
Fire Rainbow